China wages subtle data war with Taiwan

As the relationship in business increases over the Strait between Taiwan and China, the RoC is finding itself approving the kind of things it wouldn’t have dreamed of just five years ago.

Chunghwa Telecom, or CHT, wants to run a submarine cable between Taiwan and a city on China’s southeastern coast, and it has just been given the stamp of approval by the National Communications Commission. It’s certainly a more subtle way to edge in on the annoying democratic little brother and it doesn’t draw the same kind of attention from the US as moving in the warships.

The main draw is for improving business links and data communications between the two countries. The cable, reports Digitimes, will be built from Kinmen near China’s coast to teh city of Xiamen and will be the first of its kind, ever. It will cost $6.8 million, with a helping hand from Taiwan’s CHT with the rest ponied up by China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom.

Expats living in Taipei predict a physical invasion would take about a day, tops, to bring Taiwan to its knees. However, that kind of provocation is similar to poking at the United States with a lightweight cattle prod. Although some war analysts believe the US should leave Taiwan to the Chinese, for now it is still an ally.

And China thinks Taiwan is China.

As with the rest of the world, and as our ex-spook friend Terry Shannon said for years, a much smarter way to seize control is by making sure it’s your country that runs the infrastructure.

Thanks to appealing business propositions from bustling Beijing, and relatively cheap-as-chips offers from companies with established links to Chinese banks and military, everyone is taking that bite.

While it may seem over-the-top to kick up a fuss about one line of communication, scratch under the surface and it looks like the old ways of war equals money isn’t something that interests China, careful five year plans and playing on corporate and government greed means money equals war.

Poor Taiwan is always getting invaded by someone. This time it is another country’s long term corporate interests.